originalmaja.de

Subtext, only. Fuck you!

I’m having one of these moments again; where I just woke up with a crushing conclusion.

Pardon my English. (Teach me!)

It is this: during my school years I never got to read a coherent poetic text (= a text I could unterstand). At least not in that sense that I was able to perceive coherence, meaning.

We had to learn and read texts (- not its meaning -) in early schooling. And later we had to read, learn and study subtexts. The big words, the heavy poets, subliminal authors, with coded, hidden meaning.

And it was so frustrating; I was very much aware that I already had difficulties understanding what non-subtle people wrote… yes, am talking about easy no-subtext words! They were the problematic thing. All my classmates seemed to have issues like this, but since most of them hated reading, they weren’t concerned, or simply not conscious about it.

But the fact was: The world of written words was closed to us, inaccessible, coded, specifically so that we couldn’t crack it, so that we could feel stupid (I'm aware that I'm being childish here; I'm sorry). I remember reading “Faust” out loud in class at Realschule… We all had to do it, one after another. And afterwards, during a break, when the teacher had left the class room, I listened to sneering. And those kids we’re right. It’s appalling if you're ought to read what you can’t understand, to get no comprehensible explanations; just incoming, never ending waves of expectations.

There was no communication about meaning. How can that be? And why did we not notice?

Once, though, our music teacher explained Schiller’s “Freude Schöner Götterfunken” (Beethoven) to us. Line by line. Context and everything. And I was astonished! For the first time one of these many gibberish texts we were given… this one had meaning; and even great meaning! Each word carried something, and their sequence, too! Did this imply all other gibberish texts could be accessible? This was a very serious, nagging question to me!

Imagine! Such a question, a serious one? In what kind of mindset did that life keep me?

I learned to understand text (as distinct from: subtext) later on - on my own. It would have been so much easier if there would have been some teaching of fundamental skills... You know? How can a 9th grader understand Goethe, Schiller and whatnot... how can one understand context-dependent words, when one is way too disconnected to understand words of the present, the own context, let alone, a past one? How to grasp subtext - when there is no understanding for text?

If I hadn't learned general reading skills in my spae time, if I hadn't trained much-needed cognitive skills by means of my beloved, but simplistic "Star Trek” novels --- I might have ended up like my class mates: Left behind in that horror bubble; in which one gets taught the outside world (of feelings and passions and kindness, and general open communication) is fictional, theatrical.

Thank the lords for affordable WWW connections. No one will be able to limit that new generation of teens. Not even there where I come from! I am so very relieved! They will have reading skills; and THEY will set the standards, they are used to getting their answers.

I wasn’t. And it didn’t occur to me that questions where real. Pardon, are real.

But I'm catching up!

Tada!

Text: Marianne Jaffke, www.originalmaja.de
Bild: Dierk Schaefer (Link)